Tales From the Dragon Kingdom
by Black 13 Productions
Summary: A collection of shorts based around the Dragons and other NPCs from the first five console games.


**Remembering Raijah  
**

**Black 13 Productions  
**

**A/N:**** I had a thought. I wanted to write it. **

**Not my best writing, kinda rushed. But I still like it!**

* * *

"Elder Lateef. The Lamp Fools in Dark Passage are raising a fuss again. Also, the representative of the Dragoness' kingdom is here."

Lateef looked up from the ball of light that had been floating in front of his face, leveling his glazed green gaze somewhere over the top of Mazi's head. The dark green ripples of color against black that showed where the other DreamWeaver stood still did not give the Elder a good idea where Mazi's eyes were. The other dragon did not seem in any way phased at all by the otherwise unsettling gaze, the smoke-like aura showing no change from the usual lazy waft.

"Very good, Mazi. I will check in on that later. Who is our guest today?" Lateef asked, mimicking the half-awake drawl all experienced DreamWeavers displayed after some time.

"Unsure. She looks like a new face." came the answer.

_A new member of the Council, hm? Perhaps a part of her initiation to make contact with the Dragon's kingdom. _he thought to himself, pushing the Dream Orb he had been mulling over to one side. The shift of complete sight within the dream world in the bubble to the usual colored wisping auras of anything alive on black had long since lost surprise to the Dragon Elder.

"I will see her now. Do send her in, if you would."

"As you will, Elder."

_Ah Mazi, always respectful._

The wisps of green disappeared from view, leaving the very faint glow of brown-green off the foliage of the ground below and a pale white-blue of the water flowing in a fountain and pool nearby. Lateef stood, stretching his body to its fullest. He always lost track of time when monitoring dreams and could be at it for days without realizing. It wasn't like he could tell the shifting times of the day. It all looked black to him.

His jaws had parted in a wide yawn, wings and tail fin flaring when he heard the soft steps of a newcomer. She announced herself, an accent on her voice that he had never heard before even in his own visits to the Dragoness' kingdom.

"Is this how you greet all your guests? With a show of physical prowess?"

The way her voice rolled like a honeyed sweetness. It made it difficult to tell if she was joking with him or if she was honestly serious in the matter. Whatever it was, it made the Elder male snap everything back in to his body, his jaws to close. His head lowered, drinking in the sight of an aura of iridescent midnight blue. The form it made betrayed a sleek creature, perfect in every aspect and angle. Ah, if he could only see her eyes.

Blinded gaze centered on a place just over her head. Usually, Lateef focused most on a spot over the heads of those who came to him, placing peridot-green glaze just barely on the crown.

"I do apologize, My Lady Dragoness. You seem to have caught me while I was in the middle of my rounds." he replied, fatigued and softly spoken but not unkind. "I hear you are a new member of the Council?"

There was a rumbling purr from her at this, an undertone of blatant amusement. She came forward at being addressed with movements not unlike a cat's. Smooth, effortless, with a twitch of balance at the end of her tail. To be honest, not even DreamWeaver dragonesses had the outline of the newcomer nor did they emanate elegance in the same regal way.

"Indeed I am." she finally stated once she was close enough to the Dragon Elder. "I am called Raijah. Her Lady of Celestine, Galatea, sent me to begin relations with both sides of the DreamWeaver kingdoms." There was a pause here. Lateef could blatantly feel her assessing him visually. "I am to assume you are as blind as they say...?"

Lateef allowed his own rumble of amusement to escape. "I see I am a story of my own in even legendary corners of the world." he chuckled. "Celestine is quite a ways. Passed the Crags, if I remember correctly. Geography was not my strongest subject." A small quirk of a smile was given, spreading just enough across his muzzle. "Although the stories are true about dear old Lateef, I can assure I am blind to a very limited extent."

She reflected his laugh, hers like a little music box. Tinkling, melodic... "Everyone knows of Lateef, he who lead the first attack in the War against the Nightmares. He who suffered his sight to make certain the world could dream good dreams so long as he watched over them. He who has countless times foiled the King of Fools' ploys and plots to take the world time and again..."

"Actually, foiling the ploys and plots of Jacques falls on Mazi. Without his Clock Fools, we certainly would not know of any of them. Relations with the kingdoms of the Fools are strained and we only really deal with him when we must." Lateef corrected, relaxing his body from the usual posture an Elder accepting a newcomer to their presence was trained to take.

"Humble, as well." Raijah sounded almost amused by their exchange. There was a small hint of admiration in her vocal undertone.

"I only believe that Mazi gets what credit he is due. It seems only fair to him, he who works so hard to keep the lands peaceful and free from the smaller nuisances." The Elder strode forward, making sure to be careful not to bump into her. "However, I am not against showing the fruits of my own labor. I have greatly improved our kingdom from the days of Hassan. If you would like to see them?"

Here, the Celestial dragoness laughed some. Low, knowing. "I assume you will need a guide...?" The question was posed in an almost playfully tentative way.

The answer was as she expected; she gave a small chuckle to his scoff. "My Lady Raijah! I assure you I can navigate all corners of my kingdom without assistance!"

As though to accentuate the point, when he looked to her to say such, the wall leading outside from his garden chamber made his acquaintance with a small clinking noise of glass-like scales against sandstone. She laughed at him as he made contact with it, huffing with indignation toward the obstacle.

"So I can see." she taunted at him, exiting through the door.

"I can honestly assure you, my Lady, that under normal circumstances I would be able to avoid this." he responded, his tone haughty. With that, he moved his serpentine form out the door near her.

_Dad._

"So then, Elder." She was playing with him now, the tone in her voice causing his ears to flatten almost in equally playful annoyance. "Where are we going first in your kingdom?"

"I hear there is a small disturbance in the deeper reaches of Dark Passage. If you would be so kind as to accompany me, perhaps I will also be able to demonstrate how political uprisings of such nature are... _Dad. You need to wake up. _...handled in such situations." he told her, spreading his wings and opening the tail fin once he knew he was pointed in the right direction.

_You __**know**__ Mazi doesn't like you sleeping..._

"Ah, that sounds delightful! Something to add to my report for Her Lady Galatea."

_**Dad!**__ Wake __**up!**_

* * *

Lateef woke with a start, snapping his head upward. His body had been coiled around itself, the tail under his nose.

"_What_?"

The tone of voice he used sounded more like an angry sleep-deprived monstrosity, but that was what he was now, wasn't it? The Elder dragon looked around, trying to adjust back to the dull sights of the grass beneath him, the water nearby ... and the wafting vision of the mint-green and dark blue aura nearby that could only be his son, Zikomo. Every so often, the smoky tendrils gleamed with just that hint of iridescence Celestial dragons were known to possess.

The shape was small, sitting on its haunches with a small Dream Orb in its clutches. Though he squinted at the Orb, he couldn't make out much more passed pastel colors in blues and pinks.

"You were sleeping again. Almost left this dream go unattended." Zikomo told him, an almost hurt emotion rising from under his words.

Lateef's ears flattened to his head, not in annoyance but in shame to have snapped so fiercely. "I apologize. I was not expecting to have drifted off like that." He pointed his nose toward the Orb. "Have you been tending it since?"

"Yes. I have. No one should have a bad dream because someone loses face like that." he replied. His words came off insulting, though the Elder knew that was not meant. "Did you want it back?"

Lateef thought a moment. He could take it back from his son, the future Elder. On the other hand, Zikomo had shown a surprising amount of maturity and responsibility in making sure all was well with someone else's dream before worrying for his sleeping father. He had picked up a previous task that the Elder had indeed 'lost face' for.

"...If you do not tell Mazi of my slip-up or the further nap I am to take now, you may keep it. Prove to me that you can handle a dream from beginning to end and you may have it." the older dragon responded.

There was a moment of silence, Zikomo clutching the Orb to his chest to bound off and check where the adviser was. When he was satisfied with his observations, he returned and took a position next to the entrance corridor into the small cozy chamber.

"Alright, but I'm going to wake you up if I see Mazi anywhere nearby." he replied, pulling the Orb out from where he had it clutched.

Lateef nodded. "As is right. Good boy. I will see you when I wake, whichever the reason my be."

With a small nod from the younger dragon, he curled back up and fell back asleep. Zikomo waited until he knew his father was right on the edge of sleep, awake enough to accept new dreams but far enough gone he would not notice the world around him. The Dream Orb he had inherited was seen to briefly enough to know that it would not go wrong if he left it unattended for a few moments before he set it to one side, still within sight.

His forefeet were drawn together, concentrating his energy into another blank Orb, glowing in his claws with a faint silvery light. He pointed it toward his father, sleeping seemingly peaceful dreams. Slowly, the sketchy drawings of what the elder was dreaming of came into being, Zikomo recognizing the shimmering midnight blue hide of his mother, the ivory-colored antlers atop her head, and those kind and loving eyes of pale powder blue. Carefully, the young Elder-in-training worked his thumb claws into the surface of the Orb, watching it ripple with the penetration, before he moved the points about as he had been taught, carefully weaving as though with fine threads the image within. Slowly, the sketch turned into something tangible, something lovely. When the task had finished? When his mother had become something shimmering against the still-sketched background, he left the Orb nestled against the curve of his father's body.

A glance to his Elder as he went back to the first Orb caused a small smile to spread across the adolescent dragon's face, watching as the sleeping DreamWeaver curled tighter around the shimmering Orb left for him, the image of the young dragoness laughing and giving him good dreams.


End file.
